Seahawks Superbowl Defeat and Praying for Turbulence

I’ve had some feedback on my blog I wrote on February 2^nd about the Superbowl and how the Seahawk loss may be a blessing in disguise.  As you can imagine, most who are avid fans do not care much for the post nor do they believe losing could possibly be a good thing and I certainly can understand why. In the moment, defeat is never easy nor does it guarantee any sort of eventual triumph. The idea however that challenges and even defeats can be some of the most important events in our life that propel us to success is interesting.         

In life, our natural instinct is to hope and pray for smooth sailing.  We believe if the waters remain calm than all of our hopes and dreams will come true.  The reality however is that smooth sailing rarely gets us to where we want to go.  In fact normally just the opposite is true.  Those who do not encounter or who do all they can to avoid rough waters usually end up feeling empty and dissatisfied at the end of their journey. 

Recently while attending a leadership conference one of the speakers suggested that we pray for turbulence.  The audience laughed nervously after this comment only to realize the speaker was serious!  The speaker shared that turbulence does two things from a business perspective.  First, it eliminates the weak and those who would prefer not to deal with turbulence, leaving only the truly committed to compete.  Second, it forces us to cling tighter to our values and pushes us to remain humble and hungry for success.  During the presentation the speaker shared several examples of organizations who had smooth sailing from the beginning and eventually failed and others who endured severe headwinds, even to the point of bankruptcy, before succeeding tremendously. The speaker concluded that despite our nervousness in the room, turbulence is a good thing!

I admit the idea of praying for turbulence is a scary prospect!  Rarely is it enjoyable passing through it but the reality is that time and time again it has proven to be the best way to help us reach our potential and be successful.  So, let’s brace ourselves for the ride and be prepared to meet turbulence head on knowing that adversity and struggles create the opportunities for us to be better than we’ve ever been before.    

How Will You Measure Your Life

The title alone of the book “How Will you Measure your Life” by Clayton M. Christensen almost instantly provokes readers to reflect on those things that matter most in life, and indeed this is what the focus of the book is all about.  I’d like to discuss two of the main important points expressed in the book.

#1  “The only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work.  And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”

We must do what we love.  Too many of us are unfulfilled or unsatisfied in life because of the work we choose to do.  We tell ourselves to tough it out, it pays really well, my options are limited, or that we will stick with it only for a few more years and then we will move on to pursue our real passion.  The problem is time passes quickly and before we know it, our life feels empty and we are full of remorse because we did not pursue our dreams.  We can become distracted or enticed by many alluring things such as money, power, ease, or prestige and in the end, none of it will matter much if we have sacrificed things that deeply matter to us. The author believes all things are possible and that each one of us can find a way to make a living doing what we love.  It may not be easy to discover or handed to us on a plate, but if we continue to search we will one day find something worth working for—something satisfying and fulfilling to us.  Thus we shouldn’t settle on a job, but instead look for work and a career that is personally meaningful. 

#2 “How we allocate our own resources can make our life turn out to be exactly as we hope or very different from what we intend.” 

How we spend our resources demonstrates what is important to us.  Each of us has limited resources which includes such things as our time, talent, and money and how we allocated these resources demonstrates our priorities.  The author points out most of us say we value our families but many of us starve it of resources.  We spend our time and efforts away from home, often times at work for example, saying we are doing it for the good of our family yet all we end up doing is sacrificing our family for our job.  Our time and efforts need to be focused on what is most important to us.  The author also states that by looking at a man’s checkbook you can easily discover what matters to him.  (For me this statement made me look at my checkbook!)  We are given limited resources in life and we all need to evaluate how we are using them.  If they are not being put to good use, by being utilized toward those things that matter most to us then, we need to change and adjust.  Giving ample resources to things that matter most will give us great results in life.    

We all need to contemplate how we will measure our lives.  Will it be by the career we had, the money we earned, or the prestige we gained?  Or will it be by the relationships we formed, the people we helped, and the good things we have done?  The choice is ours—it is up to us.  Each of us one day will face the end of the road, so we must decide now how we want our life to look when it is over. 

To see how I rated this book click here

We Can Do Hard Things!

This post has been modified and was originally posted 7/20/2010

My family and I recently returned from a trip to Utah—hence the dearth in blogs lately…During the trip we spent much of our time at a beautiful lake near the Bear River Mountains. One day our group planned various hikes through the majestic mountains with rugged terrain and peaks that soared to nearly 10,000 feet. With a pregnant wife and three young children my family decided we’d stick to the flat, even surfaced three quarter mile hike. However, at the last minute we decided to try the somewhat steep and rocky 8 mile hike—just to see how far we could make it before turning back. To my surprise, and with my 2 year-old son in arms nearly the entire trip, our family completed the eight mile hike together.

In life, we are often faced with challenges and opportunities that are difficult and often seem impossible. However, our potential and capacity is amazing. Many times we underestimate or do not realize what we can do. Many times we put self-imposed limits on ourselves and say in essence, ‘I’m just going to play it safe and stick with the flat ¾ mile hike’.  By so doing we fail to venture to the unknown or dare to do the impossible.  We don’t even give the 8 mile hikes that face us a chance. Whether it’s fear, a lack of confidence, complacency, or other reasons, we often hold back and do not push ourselves. For some reason, somewhere along our life journey, we begin to believe we cannot do hard things. I have learned through this hiking experience and other experiences that we can in fact do hard things. We can do things that are beyond our own wildest imaginations, if we allow ourselves to believe and try.

At the beginning of the day I never believed my family could or would complete the trip. I thought it would be too difficult for us, but we did it. It wasn’t always easy, and at times I doubted we’d make it all the way; but we did. And because we did, we were able to view some of the most spectacular views and enjoy the peace and serenity of the mountains. We saw wild flowers blooming in colorful, luscious fields, majestic peaks soaring high above us in the air, a buck scampering across snow in search of food, and a calm crystal-clear hidden lake. The reward for our efforts was beauty and tranquility all around us, as well as a great sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. And for my 5 and 6 year-olds, who walked the entire trip on their own, they can now look back on this experience and feel good about who they are and what they can achieve.

So what rewards are we missing, because we are unwilling to do hard things? And why do we deny ourselves of the incredible sense of satisfaction and accomplishment that comes from achieving difficult tasks? Our potential is great, and each of us has the capacity to do great things. Let’s stop holding back, and start believing that we can do hard things!

Heads up Seattle--Losing the Superbowl is a Good Thing!

The Superbowl is over and what a game it was!  Even after the time ran out, I still couldn’t believe what I had seen. Having grown up in the state of Washington, I was heartbroken by the results.  After mourning for a moment, it came to me that this perhaps could be the best thing that ever happened to Seattle. 

I know, I know, even as I write this I find myself screaming in my head, “Are you crazy?! Can losing a Superbowl really be a good thing?" But I think the answer may be yes. 

Throughout my career I have had the chance to work with many different teams.  I’ve observed and experienced that one of the most difficult things to deal with, navigate, and sustain for any team is a whole lot of success.  A high level of success has a way of tearing teams apart and stealing the humility, desire, and drive that often gets these teams to where they are.  I’ve seen a bunch of success set the bar so high for a team that anything short is viewed as a complete failure, which leads to discouragement and discord.  Yes, I’ve observed that a whole lot of success quickly almost always means the impending doom of a great team.      

On the flip side, having such a shocking blow can also be difficult to deal with and overcome.  Many teams crumble and come apart when they are met with incredible and sudden disappointment, but many also do just the opposite.  I’ve seen very successful teams deal with very difficult challenges in a way that propels them to higher levels than ever before.  Though they were once successful, after having overcome adversity, they become something even more, even better than they once were or ever could have been without the adversity.  If this loss leads to more victories for Seattle in the future, more than they would have had without it, than this difficulty can only be viewed as an incredible blessing.  Only time will tell.     

I do believe that the odds of a team bouncing back from a heartbreak are about 50-50. However, I think the odds of successfully dealing with the enormous challenges of a lot of quick success to be much less than that; so I’ll take my chances.  Though we will never know for sure how things would have turned out for Seattle had they pulled it off in the end, as a fan, I hope this tough loss will keep their hunger and drive for greatness stronger than ever, rather than quench their fire.  I know I’m already fired up for next season! 

In business and in life we can learn that our setbacks can be some of the biggest blessings in our lives, as long as they help keep our drive alive.  We need to remember that adversity almost always sets the stage for lasting greatness.  Though the blow was crushing for Seahawk players and fans, I have a feeling the best may be yet to come.